Dismissed with Prejudice
| Next = | Episode list = Season 1}} The Major Crimes Division reinvestigates a case Tao worked in 2004 when the conviction is overturned. Meanwhile, Rusty meets his father for the first time. The Victim * Elaine Reichman, wife of Will Reichman and mother of Lydia Reichman. Elaine was a insurance adjustor. Killed on April 3, 2004. She was eventually discovered to have been romantically involved with Benito Zapata and they were working together in the embezzlement scheme. * Benito Zapata, a wanted embezzler. Zapata owned an auto-body shop that was fraudulently billing for repairs. Will Reichman hypothesized that Elaine got wid of Zapata's schemes and Zapata killed her for it. It was eventually discovered that he was also murdered on April 3, 2004, just like Elaine, as they were romantically involved and they were working together in the embezzlement scheme. The Suspects * Will Reichman, Elaine Reichman's husband and father of Lydia Reichman. Was originally arrested in 2004 for the murder of his wife. Will's conviction was overturned in 2012 after his daughter, Lydia, changed her story about what happened the night of the murder. * Benito Zapata, a wanted embezzler. Zapata owned an auto-body shop that was fraudulently billing for repairs. Will Reichman hypothesized that Elaine got wid of Zapata's schemes and Zapata killed her for it. It was eventually discovered that he was also murdered on April 3, 2004, just like Elaine, as they were romantically involved and they were working together in the embezzlement scheme. Evidence * Blood evidence * Main power to the house was shut off * Lydia Reichman's story * The missing $1.8 million dollars * Emails between Elaine and Zapata * Password cracking program used by Will Reichman * The murder weapon * Broken tip of the murder weapon * Elaine Reichman's murder * Benito Zapata's body Plot Events of the murder (2004) The case starts with a flashback to April 3, 2004, when then-Detective Mike Tao responded to investigate the murder of Elaine Reichman. Tao personally had to flip on the power back to the house as Will Reichman claimed the murdered had turned it off. During Tao's interview with Will, he reported that he missed his flight at LAX and drove back home, finding an intruder at the house stabbing his wife after he had robbed the family's safe. According to Will, the intruder then ran out the back door of the house. Tao questioned when Will had cut his hand and he explained that it must have been when he pulled the knife out of his wife in an attempt to save her life. Tao then interviewed Lydia, the 10-year-old daugter of Will and Elaine, who reported seeing her father stabbing her mother. Lydia testified to what she had seen in her father's trial and based on the given evidence and Lydia's statement, Will was found quilty of first-degree murder of his wife on December 3, 2004, eight months after the crime had occurred. Restarting the Investigation In 2012, the case was re-heard by Judge Craig Richwood after Lydia issued a new statement about the events of the night of the murder. Some of the blood evidence that wasn't tested originally in 2004 for budget reasons was tested for the new hearing and the blood of Benito Zapata was found at the scene, supporting Will Reichman theory of the intruder. Judge Richwood ruled in favor of Will Reichman and dismissed the case with prejudice, meaning it can't be tried again even if new evidence arises which would prove his guilt. After the session ended, Det. Sykes masqueraded as a news anchor, with Buzz as her cameraman, asked Lydia if she wanted to listen to an on-air apology from Lt. Tao which she agreed to. Tao apologized to her and gave Lydia the original interview tape from 2004, hoping that it would help her remember what happened back then, as even though his father can't be tried for the murder again, Lydia is still a eyewitness to her mother's murder. Lydia told Tao that she researched what was on TV that night and apparently it was a scary movie about a man who murdered his wife, and that was why she said the terrible things about her father. Back at the PAB, Capt. Raydor wanted to know how the original case got so upside down. Tao explained that back in 2004, DNA tests cost about €1000, and as they took over 200 samples from the crime scene and with a trial budget of $50,000, they chose 25 samples and the defense chose their 25. There apparently wasn't much blood in the kitchen where Zapata's blood was found at and Will Reichman thought it was his. Tao gave the squad a walkthrough of the supposed events of the night: The attacker stabbed Elaine Reichman by the door to the master bedroom, she fought back so the attacker stabbed her again. She then crawled into the front room, trying to get out the sliding glass door. The attacker pulled her by the hair, slit her throat, stabbed her in the chest four more times (which was deemed to be overkill, passionate, and personal). The attacker also used enough force to break the tip off the knife (which was taken from the victim's kitchen) but it wasn't found at the time, as according to Will, the tip was already broken beforehand. Will Reichman had also bought a big roll of plastic, some cement, and a shiny new shovel one week before his wife's murder which he claimed was for the yard. Will also claimed to have given his 10-year-old daughter a sleeping pill, as according to him, whenever he went away on business, she became hysterical. Tao had tested the girl's cocoa and had found Ambien in it but she hadn't finished it, because if she had, she wouldn't have woken up in time to catch her father with the knife in his hand. Tao concluded that Will Reichman's defense attorney was right, he hadn't given any credence to Will's intruder theory and always thought he had done it "from the get-go." Lt. Provenza noted that it was probably because "he's guilty as hell." When Det. Sykes asked Provenza how he could be so sure, he gave her three good reasons: # It's always the husband. # It's always the husband. # It's always the husband. Capt. Raydor noted that comments like that are exactly what Mr. Reichman's civil attorney will want Provenza to say while he's suing the LAPD for millions of dollars in damages. Tao noted that in his mind, the original investigation was solid. Although Will had an alibi, there were enough holes in it which gave prosecution reasonable doubt to suspect that he still could have pulled off the murder. The alternate suspect that they now have is Benito "Benny" Zapata who is wanted for embezzlement from the State of Colorado. Capt. Raydor tasked Lt. Provenza to look for Mr. Zapata with the help of Special Agent Fritz Howard, the LAPD–FBI Liaison, as Mr. Zapata is also wanted by the FBI. After a short while, Will Reichman arrives at the PAB, furiuos, about the fact that Lt. Tao had given Lydia the orginal interview tape, asking him why he's trying to drag her through the ordeal once again, because if they want to know something, they should just ask him. Tao and Raydor interview Will, wanting to know why Lydia changed her statement after all these years. Will says that she finally grew old enough to understand right from wrong. Will is also suing Lt. Tao, the LAPD, and the City for wrongful imprisonment. When asked if Will knew Zapata, he said he didn't but hypothesized that because Zapata owned an auto-body shop that was fraudulently billing for repairs and Elaine was an insurance adjustor, she might have gotten wind of Zapata's schemes and Zapata killed her for it. Back at the squad room, Special Agent Howard had arrived and was going through the FBI's files on Zapata. According to Interpol, Zapata was not in Europe, South America, or Mexico. The FBI's also had a UFAP (Unlawful Flight to Avoid Prosecution) warrant out on Zapata since late in 2004. According to Howard, Zapata had left his entire life behind and the FBI didn't even know about his embezzlement until a year after he had disappeared. Zapata's embezzlement was reportedly in the "sweet spot", meaning he took enough to be wanted but not enough to be too wanted. When asked if the FBI was even sure Zapata had left the country, Howard noted that he had flown to Costa Rica one month before the murder, and he speaks fluent Spanish. The money, however, was never found, but if he has taken it out in increments (lower than $90,000 a year), it would be virtually untraceable. After all this new information, Capt. Raydor wanted to hear Zapata's wife's opinion on the matter, but as she is still in Colorado, the LAPD doesn't have the budget to fly her out to LA. At this point, Lt. Tao offered to pay for the ticket himself or that he'd fly to her, using his vacation days, because according to him, finding Zapata is the least he can do. But rather than taking Mike up on his offer, Raydor threw the ball to Special Agent Howard, since the FBI is also interested in Zapata maybe the FBI could fly her down to LA, which he agrees to (after some phone calls to his bosses). Closing the Case After Zapata's wife was flown to LA and Howard brought her to the PAB, the wife suggests that since Zapata was having multiple affairs, if they locate a woman who went missing around the time he did, they'll find him. The squad realizes that Elaine could match that description and contact a bank in Costa Rica where they discover she had a bank account with $1.8 million dollars in it, exactly the amount of money Zapata stole. She had also renewed her passport just a week prior to her death. They now realize Elaine wasn't Zapata's victim, she was his lover and accomplice. This also explains Zapata's blood at the crime scene: Will Reichman murdered Elaine and Zapata. He was a second victim, not the killer. While Raydor and Fritz Howard confront Will Reichman, Tao and DDA Meeks go through the murder scene with Lydia Reichman once more. Lydia remembers hearing a commotion and her parents yelling then what she believes was Zapata walking away outside carrying something. According to Lydia, her father must've followed him because he came back later. Lydia went downstairs to find her father over her mother's body, stabbing her though she later convinced herself that he was trying to save her. Tao explains that what happened was Reichman found out about his wife and Zapata's affair and came home early to confront and kill them. He killed Zapata at the sink where the blood evidence was found and then he disposed of Zapata's body. Afterwards, he went to kill Elaine, but she was only wounded and tried to crawl away so he had to finish her off and before he could hide her, Lydia walked in on him. He staged a break-in to cover up the murders and hoped that no one would believe Lydia. However, he didn't count on Tao believing her story and continuing to believe it to that day. At the same time, Raydor and Fritz reveal that thanks to the Patriot Act causing servers to keep all files, they were able to locate emails between Elaine and Zapata confirming their romantic and criminal connection. The FBI was also able to find that Reichman hacked Elaine's computer where he would've found the emails and then had motive for murder out of jealousy. Tao leads the police in searching the grounds of Reichman's home and using special equipment, they find Zapata's body hidden in an underground chamber under a stone slab. During autopsy, Morales finds the broken-off tip of the murder weapon, something that Reichman had claimed in the past had been broken before his wife's murder. Tao and Raydor confront Reichman with this new evidence causing his lawyer to remind them that they can't charge him again for his wife's murder even if they could prove it. However, they can still charge him for Zapata's murder and can use the wife's murder as evidence. At Raydor's prompting, Tao gleefully arrests Reichman once again for premeditated murder. Rather than go through another trial, Reichman takes a deal of life in prison. Tao speculates to Lydia that it was to prevent her from having to testify against him, again, and his way of saying he was sorry. When Lydia faces her father for the last time, he tells her his only regret is that he didn't murder her too, leaving Lydia visibly, and understandably, distraught. Guest Cast * Tina Ivlev (Lydia Reichman) * Paleigh Knight (10-year old Lydia Reichman) * William R. Moses (Will Reichman) * Chris Butler (DDA Meeks) * Erich Anderson (Defense Attorney James Corbett) * Maria Russell (Mrs. Zapata) * Efrain Figueroa (Mr. Valdez) * Barry Livingston (Defense attorney from eight years earlier) * Laura Leyva (Judge Black, the judge from eight years earlier) * Denise Williamson (Mrs. Kane, Clerk of the Court) * Summer Sagan Perry (Reporter) Recurring * Steve Tom (Judge Craig Richwood) * Ian Bohen (Daniel Dunn, Rusty's biological father) Locations Episode Notes Trivia *In the flashbacks, Tao has a moustache which he also had during the beginning of The Closer. Episode Media Tao, 2004.png|Det. Mike Tao in 2004 Category:Major Crimes Category:MC Season 1 Category:Episodes Category:Directed by: Jon Tenney